How much are you worth in onions? You don’t know, right? The exciting news is that supermarkets are getting self-service counters where you can scan an item’s bar code and then jump up and sit on the weighing scales yourself.

After learning my value in onions (more than $130!), I was planning to work through a wide range of supermarket items (wouldn’t you love to know your worth in chocolate or floor mops?)

But I had to leave, as my embarrassed children had run off, shouting: “He’s not with us.” (Children have NO respect these days.)

That was in Britain. The good news for the intellectually curious is that do-it-yourself supermarket check-outs are coming to Asia. They are being tested at a new zero-staff, honesty-based store in China. That should be interesting, as the food sector in that country is not exactly legendary for its moral integrity. “Comrade! We sold every item in the supermarket on the first day! We got a dollar fifty!”

Yet people promoting be-your-own-cashier stations claim that humans have a natural sense of morality.

If that’s true, it’s buried pretty deep. Just last week I overheard a pregnant colleague saying that her husband spent the whole weekend “babyproofing” their house. I was shocked and plan to tell her that if the kid can’t get in, she can leave it with me.

But it did occur to me that maybe places with low crime rates, such as Japan, are evidence of natural morality. Remember the inexperienced guy who tried to rob the Saitama Resona Bank in Kumagaya some years back? “Any idea how you rob a bank?” the man, armed with a knife, politely asked counter staff. They politely responded that they did not, and suggested he leave. He accidentally cut himself with his knife on the way out, but police kindly got his wound seen to.

Still, natural morality makes sense to me, as I totally believe in karma. I’ll never forget the nice woman named Chen who took her dog for a walk near her home in China’s Laohekou city in Hubei. A horrible pair of snatch thieves on a motorbike grabbed the parcel she was carrying and sped off with it. They got clean away with a large portion of fresh, warm dog poo. Nice one, karma.

Stop press: a reader just sent me a recent news item that is relevant. A pair of drug-pushers in the US sampled their own stock and became woozy and paranoid. They convinced themselves that they were being pursued by law enforcement agents (which was not the case) and so gave themselves up to police. Did their subconscious sense of morality cause them to have themselves arrested? Or is there another word for it, such as “stupidity”?

I was still puzzling this out when another crime story arrived. A bank robber with a red beard in the US city of Pittsburgh raided four banks. On his fifth and sixth, he wore a disguise: a fake red beard, carefully balanced over his real red beard. Is this madness or genius?

There is a very thin line between acts of idiocy and acts of brilliance. I wish someone would explain that to my children.

Customers line up outside a New Delhi bank to exchange outdated currency or make withdrawals. (A. Pasricha/VOA)

New Delhi, Jan 20, 2017: The Arunachal Pradesh Government on Friday took the historic step to go cashless with the inauguration of ‘Digi Dhan Mela’ in tune with the central government’s programme of ‘100 cities 100 melas’ for a cashless economy.

The Digi Dhan Mela, a central government initiative, is aimed at incentivising digitally enabled transformation in the country following the November 8 demonetisation of Rs 1,000 and Rs 500 notes.

Addressing a gathering, Civil Aviation Minister Ashok Gajapathi Raju called upon people to join the digitisation movement and strengthen Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s efforts in making India a front-runner in the world.

Emphasising on the need for a collective effort from all citizens, the minister said it was necessary for the country to move along with the government.

Appreciating the enthusiastic response of the people to go digital and contribute towards nation building, Union Minister of State for Home Kiren Rijiju called for organising the mela in districts and zillas (blocks) so that people from every corner are covered.

Rijiju said development and success cannot be achieved without hard work and pain. (IANS)